A Cooper Cronk field goal stole the win from a tenacious Wests Tigers outfit during golden point in a controversial match at Leichardt Oval.
From the whistle the match promised everything, with a try from a Cooper Cronk kick in only the second minute of the game to Suliasi Vunivalu who was on debut.
The Tigers attack though was on and it was only five minutes later that Josh Addo-Carr scored for the Tigers from a sweeping backline movement that saw a handy bat on from James Tedesco, locking it up at 4-4.
From the restart the Tigers marched down the field, finding themselves in attacking kick range, Robbie Farah weaving through a grubber kick for Chris Lawrence to be within reach of the bouncing ball, before being taken out by Storm’s Kennar.
Rightly so, the bunker gave a penalty, with Kennar taking a ten minute break in the sin bin. The Tigers took the two points on offer to give them a 6-4 lead.
The following period saw an unconcerned 12-man Storm get into a little grind, with soft penalties and lack of pressure from the Tigers allowing it.
Against the run of play, Luke Brooks nailed an intercept and made the 60m dash to score, with a Jordan Rankin conversion, giving the Tigers a 12-4 lead into half time.
A lacklustre storm looked as though they would need to score first after half time, and that they did, through an old-fashioned dummy and go from Cooper Cronk, with Cameron Smith nailing his only conversion for the night, for the Storm to be back in the picture at 12-10 deficit.
The next ten minutes saw some strange and controversial calls, with a bizarre tripping incident going penalised but with no time in the bin.
As the game went on, the Storm seemed to finally find their structure and composure again, while the Tigers were potent in attack but questionable in defence.
The Storm crossed again through Korobeite in the 58th minute giving the Storm a 18-12 lead.
The Tigers weren’t done though and in the 68th minute a try to Kevin Naiqama got them within reach at 18-16. Jordan Rankin couldn’t convert to even it up.
With two minutes left, Rankin had his chance as Blake Green gave away a penalty for offside.
He nailed it to go into golden point.
Both sides had a flurry of shots for field goals, but predictably, it was Cooper Cronk who coolly and calmly popped a 45-metre field goal over to steal the win for Storm.
Clearly the Storm, and particularly Cameron Smith, were off their game tonight, but plenty will be taken from the win, given the fact they were off and managed to snatch victory.
The Tigers, while attack is never an issue, appear to need a more committed and bolder defence, while the improvement has been clear.
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